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Show HN: Sokyokuban, a puzzle game in a non-Euclidian world

184 points| jaspervdj | 5 years ago |sokyokuban.com

43 comments

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ArtWomb|5 years ago

Very cool. There are tons of non-Euclidean video game experiments. But this one is actually fun and definitely has potential ;)

One possible improvement is to add another degree of freedom for player movement. Being ability to rotate the sphere and see where you are located in relation to the goals would help. And make touch screen play really immersive.

Rendello|5 years ago

One of my favourite games of all time is called Knossu and is also non-Euclidian (edit: this is wrong, see comment below), although it takes a very different approach to confusing the player. The author, Jonathan Whiting, is probably best known for his article "Why I Write Games In C" around here

It seems like the best games throw you in with no context, and let you explore their consistent but mysterious mechanics and worlds

1. https://jonathanwhiting.com/games/knossu/

2. https://jonathanwhiting.com/writing/blog/games_in_c/

unphased|5 years ago

i guess it looks like a sphere but it's hyperbolic space and the opposite "direction" of curving compared to a sphere. But I dig what you're saying, like.. maybe allow us to drag our center of projection around so we can get a sense for the space.

wodenokoto|5 years ago

Code Parade on Youtube has some nice tech demo for non-euclidean 3D game engine.

"Non-Euclidean Worlds Engine" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEB11PQ9Eo8

"Spherical Geometry Is Stranger Than Hyperbolic" - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yY9GAyJtuJ0

tartoran|5 years ago

Cool and spicy. I used to play sokoban as a kid and quickly figured out how to play it. I just wish the gameboard was larger, it is quite crammed but still playable on the phone.

xvedejas|5 years ago

How does one define a coordinate system on such a grid? I considered making a game with the same kind of grid (five squares meet at each corner) but I just couldn't figure out how to individually address each cell in a way which allows easily finding which other cell IDs must be neighbors.

2mol|5 years ago

There is a teensy explanation on the about page: https://sokyokuban.com/#about

I'm sure the authors would also be more than happy to answer that question.

makach|5 years ago

Coool! I love sokoban! Finally new levels! Woohoo! Just gotta say, this is a great game,

some quality of life changes could be

- click to move automatically to cell if unobstructed

- scoreboard

- what is the lowest amount of moves for the levels?

parisianka|5 years ago

Cool and vaporwavely, can I add it to my StumbleUpon-like website, here:

https://sharkle.com

Agentlien|5 years ago

Wow, I haven't seen anyone reference Stumble Upon in a very long time.

I'm going to check this out.

jaspervdj|5 years ago

Of course!

donaldihunter|5 years ago

It doesn’t advance past the first level for me, on mobile (ios)

Edit: after exiting Chrome, now it’s rendering the controls at bottom of the screen.

Edit: and it’s really fun.

galuggus|5 years ago

This is very interesting.

Could you move the next and reset buttons so they're easier to click?

jaspervdj|5 years ago

I'm not sure if this is the same issue but we've heard from tons of people that the "undo" button should be at the bottom in order to make it easier to reach using a phone one-handed. We've now made that change. If you're referring to something else, please elaborate :-)

cs702|5 years ago

Please add game instructions!

jaspervdj|5 years ago

Clicking and keyboard work on the computer, and tapping and swiping works on touch devices. I was hoping this would be clear enough since I don't want to take up people's time with tutorials. Maybe we can add a separate "help" button or add this to the about page?

kevinventullo|5 years ago

Would you consider putting it on the App Store?

jaspervdj|5 years ago

Yes, we considered it, but I'm not sure if and when that'll happen. However, we also added PWA features [1], so you should be able to add it to your homescreen and it should work fine offline that way. But we're not experts on this stuff, so definitely let me know if you run into issues with this.

[1]: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/Progressive_web...

unphased|5 years ago

Anyone work out the key bind for undo?

n3k5|5 years ago

It's Z, the traditional undo key in Sokoban-likes. More specifically, the key where Z would physically be on a Qwerty keyboard, regardless of what keyboard layout you have actually selected. Same goes for [R]eset.

Was almost surprised that a little web game gets this right when many native apps don't. I just checked the last three Sokoban-likes I played (Stephen's Sausage Roll, Baba Is You, A Good Snowman Is Hard To Build) and they all follow the currently active layout. Which admittedly is way better than the really annoying games that memorise the layout that's selected when you launch them and have to be completely restarted if it wasn't the one you wanted.

rob_sully|5 years ago

interesting. I struggled to understand how to orientate the moon shapes but got it near the end.